Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I hope we'll be able to see all of you again. Since we have little time, it will be difficult to answer all of our questions. Our time was cut short today, but I hope we'll be able to continue what we started.
I would like to thank you for your extremely important work. You are looking at resource issues, and the committee is trying to make sure that everything is in place so that you can do your job properly.
I would like to tell you about two articles that appeared in the paper over the past 24 hours. First, there's one in La Presse, which covers cannabis and investments from tax havens. Mr. André Lareau is quoted and, roughly translated, this is what he said:
Tax laws are making Canada a real sieve. We tell foreign investors: “Find yourself a Canadian gadget that will increase significantly in value, realize a quick gain, you won't pay tax here, and with the right structure, you won't pay tax anywhere. And it's all perfectly legal.”
My first question is on how departments and organizations coordinate their efforts in terms of tax havens. Even though you were consulted, Canada recently signed an agreement with Antigua and Barbuda and with Grenada.
Are departments and organizations consulted when Canada signs such agreements with tax haven countries, which have an enormous impact on money laundering?
The second article I wanted to cite just came out an hour and a half ago from the prestigious The Guardian newspaper in Britain. The headline is “How Canada became an offshore destination for 'snow washing'”. What follows are just brief extracts:
Canada is one the world’s most opaque jurisdictions when it comes to identifying the owners of private companies and trusts, according to anti-corruption campaigners who say that more rigorous checks are required to obtain a library card than to set up a company in the country.
“Anyone can start a company in Canada. It costs about C$200 and the owner of the company can remain completely anonymous,” said lawyer Mora Johnson, who recently authored a report detailing the country’s lax rules around corporate registration.
A 2013 study by American researchers ranked Canada worst in the world among 60 countries, along with Kenya, in terms of setting up an untraceable company.
This opacity – described in a recent Transparency International report as the “getaway car of financial crime” – has become the perfect vehicle for “snow washing”: the use of Canada’s positive image to tout the country as an offshore destination where suspect transactions can be legitimised.
It goes on to cite in 2009 estimates of $15 billion a year being laundered each year in Canada, mostly through companies where ownership is unclear.
The two questions in English I would like to ask are, first off, what is the amount now that you estimate is being money-laundered through Canada, whether that's through offshore tax havens, an increasing number of which we're signing treaties with, or through other means? What do we need to change? Obviously, you're working very hard. You're doing a lot of good work with scant resources, but when we're getting the reputation internationally for snow washing, what needs to change so you can do your work more effectively?